Is it just me, or has April raced away without even stopping to say hello? There are so many things I’ve meant to do this month, and they are still not done: short stories I need to finish, proposals I need to draft, a synopsis that’s not quite right. When you’re faced with tasks that […]
Monthly Archives: April 2013
The Cruelest Month
Winter kept us warm, covering Earth in forgetful snow, feeding A little life with dried tubers. The Waste Land is not an easy poem to teach, but I’ve always liked teaching it anyway. There’s so much to contend with, even in that overly familiar opening stanza. I love that phrase–“forgetful snow.” We got 12 inches […]
The Moon has a Thousand Faces
In preparation for a film panel at WisCon 37, I’ve been catching up on my sci-fi and fantasy films. (More about my WisCon panels in another post.) So I finally got around to seeing Duncan Jones’ mesmerizing film Moon. To dismiss this film as an ordinary sci-fi thriller is really an injustice, since Moon pays […]
Swift Rejection
If you’ve been in the writing business for any length of time, you’ve been rejected. No matter who you are, no matter how successful, someday you’re going to have one of those days when the agent passes on your manuscript, when the editor can’t find a spot for your story. Sometimes the blow comes swiftly, […]
Her Smoke Rose Up Forever
In January, when we were driving across the swamps of the Yucatan, I found myself thinking about James Tiptree Jr.’s delightful story “The Women Men Don’t See.” (Spoiler: the women in question are a nondescript mother and daughter who hide in the swamps of the Yucatan, waiting for the arrival of aliens who will free […]
The Fault in Our Stars
This is just a short post to say that I have read John Green’s exquisite and heartbreaking novel The Fault in Our Stars, and I am now completely gutted. Seriously, I have not wept so hard over a fictional character since the time my disbelieving sister found me surrounded by dirty Kleenex, clutching a dog-eared […]
Unexpected Foliage
So I’ve been reading Tovah Martin’s The Unexpected Houseplant, which is the sort of gardening book that makes me want to unpack the rest of my vintage flower pots and fill them with succulents already. Paired with Ken Druse’s classic text Making More Plants, Martin’s book is there to help you, if and when you […]
Roger Ebert
Of all the arts, movies are the most powerful aid to empathy, and good ones make us into better people. – Roger Ebert Roger Ebert died yesterday. When I heard the news, I felt a great sense of grief and loss, as if one of my dearest friends had been taken from me. I trusted […]